Elena Kats-Chernin
Encyclopedia
Elena Kats-Chernin is an Australian composer
.
Elena Kats-Chernin was born in Tashkent
(now the capital of independent Uzbekistan
– but then part of the Soviet Union), and migrated to Australia in 1975.
with Richard Toop, and later with Helmut Lachenmann
in Germany. While in Europe she became active in theatre
and ballet
, composing for state theatres in Berlin, Vienna
, Hamburg
and Bochum
. In 1993 she wrote Clocks for the Ensemble Modern
. It has since been performed around the world.
s (: Iphis, 1997, Sydney; Matricide, the Musical, 1998, Melbourne; Mr Barbeque, 2002, Lismore
; Rage of Life, 2010, Antwerp), two piano concerto
s and compositions for many performers and ensemble
s, including The Song Company, the Sydney Alpha Ensemble, Dame
Evelyn Glennie
, Bang on a Can All-Stars
, Chamber Made Opera
, the Australian Chamber Orchestra
and the Sydney Symphony
. She was also commissioned to write a piece, Page Turn, for the 2000 Sydney International Piano Competition
. Her music was featured at the opening ceremonies of both the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games
and the 2003 Rugby World Cup
.
She also wrote three silent film
soundtrack
s for a co-production between German/French TV channels
ZDF
/ARTE
: Victor Sjöström's
Körkarlen
(Phantom Chariot), Billy Wilder
and Robert Siodmak's
People on Sunday
(Menschen am Sonntag), and G. W. Pabst's
Crisis.
Kats-Chernin's other works include Charleston Noir for solo piano
, Rockhampton Garden Symphonies with Mark Svendsen for solo voice
s, mixed choir
s and orchestra
, and Wild Swans
, a collaboration with choreographer
Meryl Tankard
. She has won numerous music composition prizes in Australia, and her pieces are regularly broadcast on ABC Classic FM
radio. In 2009, Kats-Chernin was commissioned by the National Museum of Australia
to write a piece for orchestra called Garden of Dreams, named for one of the architectural features of the museum, which premiered at the museum the same year.
Performances of Kats-Chernin's music are available on several commercially-released recordings. One album is Chamber of Horrors, released in August 2006 by Tall Poppies Records
. Chamber of Horrors includes Charleston Noir, for four bass
es; Chamber of Horrors, for harp
(1995), played by Alice Giles; Still Life, for viola
and piano (2001); Gypsy Ramble, for viola, cello
and piano (1996); Wild Rice, for cello (1996); and Velvet Revolution, for horn
, violin and piano (1999).
Kats-Chernin's "Eliza's Aria
" from her score for the ballet Wild Swans (ABC Classics
) is used in Lloyds TSB's
2007 television advertisements. In 2010,Wild Swans became the theme music for ABC Radio National
's, Late Night Live
program.
Kats-Chernin has written a number of ragtime
pieces for piano; one of these, "Russian Rag", was used in two different instrumental ensemble arrangements, as the theme of Late Night Live until 2010. It is also used as the New York theme in Adam Elliot
's feature film, Mary and Max
.
Kats-Chernin is a represented composer of the Australian Music Centre
.
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
.
Elena Kats-Chernin was born in Tashkent
Tashkent
Tashkent is the capital of Uzbekistan and of the Tashkent Province. The officially registered population of the city in 2008 was about 2.2 million. Unofficial sources estimate the actual population may be as much as 4.45 million.-Early Islamic History:...
(now the capital of independent Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....
– but then part of the Soviet Union), and migrated to Australia in 1975.
Europe
She studied compositionMusical composition
Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...
with Richard Toop, and later with Helmut Lachenmann
Helmut Lachenmann
Helmut Lachenmann is a German composer associated with musique concrète instrumentale.-Life and works:...
in Germany. While in Europe she became active in theatre
Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
and ballet
Ballet
Ballet is a type of performance dance, that originated in the Italian Renaissance courts of the 15th century, and which was further developed in France and Russia as a concert dance form. The early portions preceded the invention of the proscenium stage and were presented in large chambers with...
, composing for state theatres in Berlin, Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, Hamburg
Hamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...
and Bochum
Bochum
Bochum is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, western Germany. It is located in the Ruhr area and is surrounded by the cities of Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Herne, Castrop-Rauxel, Dortmund, Witten and Hattingen.-History:...
. In 1993 she wrote Clocks for the Ensemble Modern
Ensemble Modern
Ensemble Modern is a chamber ensemble dedicated to the music of modern composers. Formed in 1980, the group is based in Frankfurt, Germany and made up variously of about twenty members from numerous countries....
. It has since been performed around the world.
Australia
Since returning to Australia in 1994, Kats-Chernin has written four operaOpera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
s (: Iphis, 1997, Sydney; Matricide, the Musical, 1998, Melbourne; Mr Barbeque, 2002, Lismore
Lismore, New South Wales
Lismore is a subtropical town in northeastern New South Wales, Australia. Lismore is the main population centre in the City of Lismore local government area. Lismore is a regional centre in the Northern Rivers region of the State.-History:...
; Rage of Life, 2010, Antwerp), two piano concerto
Piano concerto
A piano concerto is a concerto written for piano and orchestra.See also harpsichord concerto; some of these works are occasionally played on piano...
s and compositions for many performers and ensemble
Musical ensemble
A musical ensemble is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles or wind ensembles...
s, including The Song Company, the Sydney Alpha Ensemble, Dame
Dame (title)
The title of Dame is the female equivalent of the honour of knighthood in the British honours system . It is also the equivalent form address to 'Sir' for a knight...
Evelyn Glennie
Evelyn Glennie
Dame Evelyn Elizabeth Ann Glennie, DBE is a Scottish virtuoso percussionist. She was the first full-time solo percussionist in 20th-century western society.-Early life:Glennie was born and raised in Aberdeenshire...
, Bang on a Can All-Stars
Bang on a Can
Bang on a Can is a multi-faceted classical music organization based in New York City. It was founded in 1987 by three American composers who remain its artistic directors: Julia Wolfe, David Lang, and Michael Gordon...
, Chamber Made Opera
Chamber Made
Chamber Made Opera is an Australian production house for contemporary opera and music-theatre. Formed in 1988 by theatre director and librettist Douglas Horton...
, the Australian Chamber Orchestra
Australian Chamber Orchestra
The Australian Chamber Orchestra was founded by cellist John Painter in 1975. Richard Tognetti was appointed Lead Violin in 1989 and subsequently appointed Artistic Director....
and the Sydney Symphony
Sydney Symphony Orchestra
The Sydney Symphony Orchestra , commonly known as the Sydney Symphony, is an Australian symphony orchestra based in Sydney...
. She was also commissioned to write a piece, Page Turn, for the 2000 Sydney International Piano Competition
Sydney International Piano Competition
The Sydney International Piano Competition of Australia is a music competition, presented by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in association with the University of Sydney and broadcast live throughout Australia. It is held every four years, over a three-week period in July-August, and is...
. Her music was featured at the opening ceremonies of both the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games
2000 Summer Olympics
The Sydney 2000 Summer Olympic Games or the Millennium Games/Games of the New Millennium, officially known as the Games of the XXVII Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event which was celebrated between 15 September and 1 October 2000 in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia...
and the 2003 Rugby World Cup
2003 Rugby World Cup
The 2003 Rugby World Cup was the fifth Rugby World Cup and was won by England. Originally planned to be co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand, all games were shifted to Australia following a contractual dispute over ground signage rights between the New Zealand Rugby Football Union and Rugby World...
.
She also wrote three silent film
Silent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. In silent films for entertainment the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, pantomime and title cards...
soundtrack
Soundtrack
A soundtrack can be recorded music accompanying and synchronized to the images of a motion picture, book, television program or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack of a film or TV show; or the physical area of a film that contains the...
s for a co-production between German/French TV channels
Television channel
A television channel is a physical or virtual channel over which a television station or television network is distributed. For example, in North America, "channel 2" refers to the broadcast or cable band of 54 to 60 MHz, with carrier frequencies of 55.25 MHz for NTSC analog video and...
ZDF
ZDF
Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen , ZDF, is a public-service German television broadcaster based in Mainz . It is run as an independent non-profit institution, which was founded by the German federal states . The ZDF is financed by television licence fees called GEZ and advertising revenues...
/ARTE
Arte
Arte is a Franco-German TV network. It is a European culture channel and aims to promote quality programming especially in areas of culture and the arts...
: Victor Sjöström's
Victor Sjöström
Victor Sjöström was a Swedish actor, screenwriter, and film director.- Biography:Born in Silbodal, in the Värmland region of Sweden, he was only a year old when his father, Olof Adolf Sjöström, moved the family to Brooklyn, New York. His mother died when he was seven years old in 1886...
Körkarlen
Körkarlen
Thy Soul Shall Bear Witness! is a 1912 novel by the Swedish author Selma Lagerlöf. It was translated into English by William Frederick Harvey in 1921. Lagerlöf was commissioned to write it by a Swedish association as a means of public education about tuberculosis...
(Phantom Chariot), Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...
and Robert Siodmak's
Robert Siodmak
Robert Siodmak was a German born American film director. He is best remembered as a thriller specialist and for the series of Hollywood film noirs he made in the 1940s.-Early life:...
People on Sunday
People on Sunday
People on Sunday is a 1930 German silent drama film directed by Curt and Robert Siodmak from a screenplay by Billy Wilder. It follows the lives of a group of residents of Berlin on a summer's day during the interwar period. Hailed as a work of genius, it is a pivotal film not only in the...
(Menschen am Sonntag), and G. W. Pabst's
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
-Biography:Pabst was born in Raudnitz, Bohemia, Austria-Hungary , the son of a railroad employee.Returning from the United States, he was in France when World War I began...
Crisis.
Kats-Chernin's other works include Charleston Noir for solo piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
, Rockhampton Garden Symphonies with Mark Svendsen for solo voice
Vocal music
Vocal music is a genre of music performed by one or more singers, with or without instrumental accompaniment, in which singing provides the main focus of the piece. Music which employs singing but does not feature it prominently is generally considered instrumental music Vocal music is a genre of...
s, mixed choir
Choir
A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
s and orchestra
Orchestra
An orchestra is a sizable instrumental ensemble that contains sections of string, brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ορχήστρα, the name for the area in front of an ancient Greek stage reserved for the Greek chorus...
, and Wild Swans
Wild Swans (ballet)
Wild Swans is a ballet by Soviet-born Australian composer Elena Kats-Chernin.The story is based on The Wild Swans by Hans Christian Andersen, and tells the tale of Eliza, a princess whose wicked-witch stepmother has changed Eliza's eleven brothers into swans...
, a collaboration with choreographer
Choreography
Choreography is the art of designing sequences of movements in which motion, form, or both are specified. Choreography may also refer to the design itself, which is sometimes expressed by means of dance notation. The word choreography literally means "dance-writing" from the Greek words "χορεία" ...
Meryl Tankard
Meryl Tankard
Meryl Tankard is an Australian dancer and choreographer who has a wide national and international reputation....
. She has won numerous music composition prizes in Australia, and her pieces are regularly broadcast on ABC Classic FM
ABC Classic FM
ABC Classic FM is a classical music radio station available in Australia, and internationally online. It is operated by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation . It was established in 1976 as "ABC-FM", and later for a short time was known as "ABC Fine Music" , before adopting its current name...
radio. In 2009, Kats-Chernin was commissioned by the National Museum of Australia
National Museum of Australia
The National Museum of Australia was formally established by the National Museum of Australia Act 1980. The National Museum preserves and interprets Australia's social history, exploring the key issues, people and events that have shaped the nation....
to write a piece for orchestra called Garden of Dreams, named for one of the architectural features of the museum, which premiered at the museum the same year.
Performances of Kats-Chernin's music are available on several commercially-released recordings. One album is Chamber of Horrors, released in August 2006 by Tall Poppies Records
Tall Poppies Records
Tall Poppies Records is an Australian record label founded in September 1991 to present Australian music and musicians by musician and recording producer Belinda Webster. It records art music, both classical or jazz, and focuses on Australian music...
. Chamber of Horrors includes Charleston Noir, for four bass
Double bass
The double bass, also called the string bass, upright bass, standup bass or contrabass, is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra, with strings usually tuned to E1, A1, D2 and G2...
es; Chamber of Horrors, for harp
Harp
The harp is a multi-stringed instrument which has the plane of its strings positioned perpendicularly to the soundboard. Organologically, it is in the general category of chordophones and has its own sub category . All harps have a neck, resonator and strings...
(1995), played by Alice Giles; Still Life, for viola
Viola
The viola is a bowed string instrument. It is the middle voice of the violin family, between the violin and the cello.- Form :The viola is similar in material and construction to the violin. A full-size viola's body is between and longer than the body of a full-size violin , with an average...
and piano (2001); Gypsy Ramble, for viola, cello
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
and piano (1996); Wild Rice, for cello (1996); and Velvet Revolution, for horn
Horn (instrument)
The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....
, violin and piano (1999).
Kats-Chernin's "Eliza's Aria
Eliza's Aria
Eliza's Aria is a classical aria from the ballet Wild Swans, composed by Elena Kats-Chernin. The piece was first recorded by soprano Jane Sheldon and the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, and released on the ABC Classics label. This recording was subsequently used in the 2007 Lloyds TSB "For the...
" from her score for the ballet Wild Swans (ABC Classics
ABC Classics
ABC Classics is the classical music record label within the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. It is internationally recognised as Australia's premier classical music label, with a catalogue of more than 500 titles...
) is used in Lloyds TSB's
Lloyds TSB
Lloyds TSB Bank Plc is a retail bank in the United Kingdom. It was established in 1995 by the merger of Lloyds Bank, established in Birmingham, England in 1765 and traditionally considered one of the Big Four clearing banks, with the TSB Group which traces its origins to 1810...
2007 television advertisements. In 2010,Wild Swans became the theme music for ABC Radio National
Radio National
ABC Radio National is an Australia-wide non-commercial radio network run by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.Radio National broadcasts national programming in areas that include news and current affairs, the arts, social issues, science, drama and comedy...
's, Late Night Live
Late Night Live
Late Night Live is an Australian radio program broadcast by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Radio National as well as on Radio Australia shortwave radio and podcast and streamed over the World Wide Web....
program.
Kats-Chernin has written a number of ragtime
Ragtime
Ragtime is an original musical genre which enjoyed its peak popularity between 1897 and 1918. Its main characteristic trait is its syncopated, or "ragged," rhythm. It began as dance music in the red-light districts of American cities such as St. Louis and New Orleans years before being published...
pieces for piano; one of these, "Russian Rag", was used in two different instrumental ensemble arrangements, as the theme of Late Night Live until 2010. It is also used as the New York theme in Adam Elliot
Adam Elliot
Adam Elliot is an independent stop-motion animation writer and director based in Melbourne, Australia. His five films have collectively participated in over six-hundred film festivals and have received over one hundred awards, including an Oscar for Harvie Krumpet and the Annecy Cristal for Mary...
's feature film, Mary and Max
Mary and Max
Mary and Max is a 2009 Australian clay-animated black comedy-drama film written and directed by Adam Elliot and produced by Melanie Coombs. The voice cast included Philip Seymour Hoffman, Toni Collette, Eric Bana, Bethany Whitmore, with narration by Barry Humphries. The film premiered on the...
.
Kats-Chernin is a represented composer of the Australian Music Centre
Australian Music Centre
The Australian Music Centre fosters the development of an Australian music community by providing specialist support to its membership of performers, composers, sound artists, educators, students, and music specialists across Australia and throughout the world.The AMC is the Australian national...
.
External links
- Elena Kats-Chernin's official MySpace page
- Elena Kats-Chernin at Boosey & HawkesBoosey & HawkesBoosey & Hawkes is a British music publisher purported to be the largest specialist classical music publisher in the world. Until 2003, it was also a major manufacturer of brass, string and wind musical instruments....
Music Publishing - Interview with Elena Kats-Chernin
- Tall Poppies Records
- "In the key of flat-out major" by Deborah Jones, The AustralianThe AustralianThe Australian is a broadsheet newspaper published in Australia from Monday to Saturday each week since 14 July 1964. The editor in chief is Chris Mitchell, the editor is Clive Mathieson and the 'editor-at-large' is Paul Kelly....
, 24 April 2010 - Audio and transcript of Kats-Chernin on convict love tokens, the subject of a movement in Garden of Dreams
- Audio and transcript of Kats-Chernin on "Kimberley points", the subject of a movement in Garden of Dreams